Slumdog Millionaire vs Run Fatboy Run

Since the independent movie boom of the early 1990s, we can always expect one small, sweet movie to make the cut with a Best Picture nomination. Don't worry, they never win. Chocolat, The Full Monty, Little Miss Sunshine and Juno all understood that the honor was just in being nominated (and raking in all those post-Oscar ticket sales). But here we have something curious. This year's Little Movie That Could...might. Slumdog Millionaire isn't just good because it's surprising and plucky and underdoggish. It's good, period. In fact, Slumdog Millionaire is as good as anything I've seen all year.

Slumdog Millionaire was directed by Danny Boyle, that rare director who has a flair for gritty, violent images, and also, go figure, working with younger actors. It's like if Quentin Tarantino discovered a knack for directing floppy-eared puppies, or if Martin Scorsese sent you a tin of brownies. Slumdog Millionaire is edited and scored fantastically (with songs by M.I.A.), visually arresting (no movie locale ever looks as beautiful/ugly as India, which exists currently as other countries are portrayed in films set in the future), and has, hands down, one of the all-time great closing credits sequences. When Slumdog Millionaire is over, you'll feel ripped off by other movies that just scroll names up a black screen.

Jamal (played by different young actors of varying ages, but most impactfully by Dev Patel) is a contestant on the Indian version of Who Wants to be a Millionaire. He's winning, and with one more correct answer, will be a millionaire. Unfortunately, it appears to the local officials (and a higher-up at the show) that he's cheating. We get cuts between the game show and a brutal interrogation in which Jamal is tortured despite his constant cries of innocence. How did a kid from desperate, poverty-stricken slums become the game show version of a genius? We see that too, in thrilling, sometimes heartbreaking flashbacks. In a lifetime not of coincidence but of distinct reference points (all our lives have them, we just don't all get paid to remember them), Jamal builds a working knowledge of the exact right twelve or so events, people and places to answer those questions later in life. It's a brilliant conceit; when I saw Slumdog Millionaire, I couldn't believe it hadn't been done before, and prepared myself for an onslaught of ripoffs.

I'm sure Slumdog Millionaire sounds gimmicky. It's not. The flashbacks, which feature hardly any adult actors, are never cutesy, but also never pander with the brutality. You'll feel sorry for the kids, but you won't feel bullied into doing so. Much of it is funny too; I can't help it, the kids are cute and even in the direst situations (they're kidnapped by a fucking awful Dickensian villain with designs to make them more pathetic so they'll score more money begging), the pluck of the kids kept me engaged in them as characters, instead of as types. And listen, I'm not an easy sell on this sort of thing. Slumdog Millionaire might sound a little Forest Gumpy, but I promise it's not (if you don't like people talking during movies, don't watch Forest Gump with me. Although in that instance, what I'm doing is more talking to the movie than during it.)

Throughout the movie, we see that Jamal's only connections are with his brother Salim and a runaway girl named Latika. All three are orphans, beg and steal on the streets, and live hand-to-mouth into their teen years. Jamal is in love with Latika, and feels an obligation to save her, but keeps losing her to stronger, more dangerous men. There's a beautiful moment near the end of the film where we see Latika as Jamal sees her--lovely, glowing, fleeting--that establishes the exact tone hundreds of movies have attempted and botched.

Mainly, it moved me. I watched the trailer again this morning, and got chills. Slumdog Millionaire is funny and sad, but also set my heart pounding. It's very exciting, and very good. Won't you see it? See it instead of The Day the Earth Stood Still, okay? For me?

Slumdog Millionaire made me feel so good I wanted to watch it right again. Instead, I watched another small import, which, like Slumdog Millionaire features a lonely guy in a contest who longs for the beautiful girl of his dreams: Run Fatboy Run.

Run Fatboy Run stars Simon Pegg as Dennis, a working-class slub in London who left his PREGNANT GIRLFRIEND AT THE ALTAR five years ago, I'm just saying, but now wants her back because she's had the nerve to select another guy to be with. His girlfriend is played by Thandie Newton, the new boyfriend by Hank Azaria. Dennis decides he's going to run a marathon to impress his girlfriend and win her back, despite the fact that a. that's stupid, and b. Azaria is also running it, and he's way more athletic.

So, here's what: Simon Pegg is a delight. Seriously. He's as enjoyable to watch in a comedy as Ricky Gervais. He's a smart, funny guy. Hank Azaria is also funny, mostly, and who doesn't like The Simpsons, right? And much of Run Fatboy Run is quite funny, and capably directed. It's a nice little movie, along the lines of maybe a lesser-ambitioned Four Weddings and a Funeral. But it is such a ridiculous movie fantasy that Thandie Newton would have these two guys as her only choices. Have you seen Thandie Newton? Take a moment. Back? Stunning, right? Can you think of anyone better suited to her than an out-of-shape loser who would leave her AT THE ALTAR WHILE SHE'S PREGNANT and uh, Hank Azaria? The list is long, right? But this is a comedy you say. Well then, no offense to Thandie Newton, but why not go the other direction and cast one of the dozens of funny, little-used actresses in Hollywood? Are we afraid of upstaging the male lead with a funny female? Is that why Mike Myers always acts opposite people like Jessica Alba and Elizabeth Hurley? So the guys get all the jokes? It'd be nice if life were like that once in a while, but I'm kind of tired of it in the movies. Who directed this? Oh yeah, David Schwimmer, who spent a decade on a show with girls that were not only better looking than him, but also got just as many good lines. That explains it. Carry on.

Slumdog Millionaire: A

Run Fatboy Run: B-